365 days of life

Post (and a picture!) on seeing Mrs. O and Mercy last night in Minneapolis.

Also, a small reflection on the fact that 365 days ago, I decided to move to Nigeria.

it's the last time

This is my last post from Nigeria. I have been so blessed this year and I am leaving with only good memories to carry me through.

Thank you for reading along with me on this adventure. Your feedback has been invaluable to me.

Blessings from here to wherever you are,
Maggie

Now Taking Requests and Making Decisions

It never occurred to me that at some point in this Nigerian Adventure, I would run out of things to say. My last few posts have only loosely connected with my experience in this amazing (and amazingly humid) nation, but nonetheless, I am currently at a loss.

This is good, on one hand, because it means that my life has normalized--so completely gelled that few day-to-day things stand out in that "Oh, the folks at home might like to hear about this!" kind of way.

This is bad, on the other hand, because it means MaggieinNigeria just became BoringMaggieInNigeria. To delay this terrible transformation, please let me know--via blog comment or direct email--if there is an aspect of culture or my life here that I have failed to mention. That's right: this blog now open to suggestions.

The only thing new these days is that I am under an inconceivable amount of stress to sort out my plans for next year. It is impossible to contemplate either outcome (at this point, everything boils down to stay/go) and I can feel myself grasping at life, trying to make it slow down.

A million moments in my day make me stop and consider the life I lead now: how much I love it, how much I will miss it, but also how torn apart I feel being so far from home. When these moments come, I give myself permission to actually feel my feelings (what a novel concept) about staying and leaving.
For example, when Ezugo buries his face in my shoulder when he sees me in the Library, I allow myself to feel love for this precious little boy and appreciation that he & his little tae kwon do uniform are a part of my life. I also allow myself to feel the sense of loss that will be mine when I no longer see Ez each morning.

The same goes for memories of home. I was in an upscale grocery store today and spied a box of SmartStart cereal, which is my Dad's breakfast of choice. I had this flash of Mom instructing me which type to buy - the one with the blueberries on the front, even though the actual cereal doesn't have blueberries in it - before heading out to buy groceries at Cub Foods. That memory washed over me and was quickly followed by helplessness. I can't do that anymore. I'm too far away. I let myself feel the sadness of separation.

Though this coping mechanism can be painful, I would rather acknowledge that making this decision feels like pinching either way and that emotions are an intrinsic part of that process. Giving myself permission to count the emotional cost of either outcome is how I'm trying to make the most informed decision. Maybe that's too analytical for you, but the whole "God will tell you what to do" isn't literal enough for me. I'm trying to find equilibrium here.

In the meantime, sleep eludes me (as does my appetite) and my face looks like a zitty teenager's.
Oh, hey there stress. Good to see ya. Again.

Today, I am frustrated.

There's a sad sort of complacency that has crept in these past few days. I'd like to ignore it and say it's just the result of finding a routine, or to blame it on the fact that I'm finally feeling comfortable here in Abuja. But although there is a chair in my living room that has been contoured to fit my bum and my slouchy back, and although I have a weekend routine of laundry and lesson plans, and although getting ready for bed is so familiar I did it in the dark last night (even a loss of power does little faze me these days), there is still this foreign ache in my heart, this feeling that something is amiss.

I feel the ache most when I bristle at my flatmate, when my students bicker, when I check out from the sermon in church, when I grow frustrated with colleagues. I ache when I talk to my best friend on the phone and the delay frustrates me more than the fact that I miss doing life side-by-side with her. I ache when my heart is so full with love for this place and simultaneously emptied by the despair of everyone I left behind.

I think the ache is just me. As in, I think the ache is my Eve nature surfacing again. I have two faces, two Maggies I pull out and put on. Sometimes the switch is so imperceptible I surprise myself. Some days I can ascertain which Maggie will reign based on the number of times I hit the snooze button. That frustrates me - do I honestly lack so much self-control that I can resign myself to being an impatient woman the moment my feet hit the tile floor? It's like self-fulfilling prophecy: I am tired, therefore today's going to be a long, bad day...therefore I'm going to deal with today being a long, bad day by putting on my angry Maggie face in protest.

I read this week that the word essay comes from the French word essai, which translates to an attempt, or a try. The essay itself used to be a collection of thoughts with no apparent conclusion. It was just an attempt at some cogitation and conclusion, and didn't require the latter. It has since morphed into a higher art form, in which the author has an objective and establishes the main points with solid supporting evidence (two words: lit. teacher.), but today, this blog post falls under the category of essai.

Just questions. No answers. Not today.

You NEED to read this

This is the most inspirational blog young woman I've ever read about:

KissesFromKatie.blogspot.com

She makes me feel surprised, convicted, inspired, and ultimately, she makes me want to do MORE. More than I'm already doing in my marble-floored, granite-countertopped, air-conditioned apartment in the (arguably) wealthiest city in Nigeria.

Oh, God, that I would endeavor to center myself in the middle of your plan for my life, following Katie's example.

Thoughts on Home

Those of you who began "following" me after I moved to Nigeria may not know that MaggieInNigeria used to be MaggieInChicago. The blog from that time in my life is here, and it was a useful tool of expression while in undergrad. I was reviewing some of the posts I wrote in the last year and a half, and am amazed at the way life has changed, and at the way God has provided.

12.31.08, "Here's to 2009 and all the changes it will bring. I can't wait!"
(Now THAT'S the understatement of the year!)

10.08.2008. On life after college graduation: "I have no plans as of right now. Due to my procrastination and the impractical nature of my liberal arts education, I'll be wandering aimlessly back to my parents' basement and waking up at 4am to serve espresso to the highly ambitious."
(Wrong. I'll be living in West Africa, making it on raw independence and the mercy of God. Interesting how life changes!)

And finally, this, on 8.12.08: "All these existential feelings have left this ache in me that I can only explain as wanting to go home. And the problem with going home is that home is a really fuzzy concept for me right now...home has so much less to do with location and so much more to do with people. Right now, home is still with my family and my best friends, but home [is also Wheaton]...Even if I wanted to keep all the pieces together, home is going to be spread out between states and people that I love and care about and no place is going to feel entirely like home. I wonder when that will change. I wonder if that will change."

This is the one I want to focus on, because it is the one that has changed the most. Ready?

Home is not a fuzzy concept anymore.

I left behind my ambiguous idea of home about the same time that I left the North American continent. Moving to Nigeria made a lot of things clear to me, but especially this: I have a home, and it's not here. Home is in the middle of the frozen tundra. Home is with Tony and OrganizedAudrey and Jake.

This realization has positives and negatives. It means that I am beyond-excited to come home for Christmas, but it also means that I'm holding my new Nigerian community at arm's length - I don't want to grow too attached. It means that I appreciate my family and even the Minnesota weather more than ever. It also means I am hesitant to put art on the walls here - it seems useless to make the flat I live in feel like home because it isn't home and it can't be.

I find this a very peculiar reaction, because I usually have no problem moving into a new place and making it feel like home. It took all of 1.5 semesters to begin calling Wheaton College "home." And when I lived and worked briefly in Chicago suburbs this summer, I settled right in. No problem.

It may be an incorrect analysis, but I think my heart may be guarded this time against the "home" feeling because God has other plans for me, beyond Nigeria. At this point, I don't see myself staying here forever.

(And I'm not saying this won't change. It's just how I feel about home after 4 months living in a completely different country.)

Whatever the reason, I feel peaceful that home has a street address.

It always did. I just forgot.

Random Thoughts on a Monday

This is not going to be a pithy blog update. Sorry, but it's Monday, and I'm running low on pithy. Prepare yourselves.

1. New Friends. Through Facebook and a mutual friend, I've met another Minnesota native teaching English Literature in Nigeria. He's 200 miles away from me in the western part of Nigeria, but he's got a kick-face blog (tendrilofthought.blogspot.com) and you should totally be jealous of his photography. I so wish I could a) take pictures like that and b) have fast enough internet to upload them.

2. Taste of Winter. Today I discovered that I can taste snow here Nigeria. If you would like to know how this is possible, given that today's high was 82 F (23 C), kindly secure yourself a box of sugar cubes.
Next, freeze them in the freezer (so the ants don't get to them). Then, as you are about to drop two cubes into your steaming cup of tea, revert to childhood for a moment and pop one in your mouth.
Before you get it all slobbery and it becomes a puddle of congealed sweetness on your tongue, however, inhale through the cube. (Good lord, I feel like such a child for even typing that. Alas...)
Take a breath of frozen-sugar-flavored air, and in that moment, my friends, you will taste SNOW. Or, at least I did. And I thought about all my childhood winters growing up in Minnesota, eating not-yellow snow in the front yard, and it made my heart glad, even if I felt like a child for doing it.

3. I get to represent my alma mater tomorrow, and I'm obnoxiously excited about it! The US Embassy is hosting a college fair for American college and universities, and not only am I sponsoring a booth for Wheaton and bringing my 10th-12th graders to the fair, but the fair organizer asked me to give a brief presentation to everyone at the morning session about Admissions Deadlines in the American system.
You see, in Nigeria, time is relative. The phrase "I'm coming" could mean: "I'll be right there," "I'll be there in an hour," "I'll be there next year," and it also means "I'm leaving."
Translate that to the world of application deadlines and you can see how a culture gap could leave some aspiring college students in the lurch when it comes to getting into college.
So tomorrow, I'm going to tell all these Nigerian students that in America, we take our deadlines seriously. If the application materials have to be in by January 1, that means send it in before January 1, don't start thinking about it on January 1 and get around to it by February 1.
I'm going to wear a suit in an effort to convince everyone that I'm more than 15 years old. It's not likely, but I'm going to try.